This week we saw the end of Ron Paul as a viable candidate. Sure, we’ll still see Digg spammed by Ron Paul zealots. Paul will still be campaigning his message of right wing Christian values. However, the Ron Paul movement took a big blow when The New Republic dug up a ton of Ron Paul newsletters filled with racism, homophobia, paranoia, and downright nuttiness. Paul claims to have not written any of the articles in question, but his campaign has seemingly given different answers. It’s been reported that Paul claims only to have not written the offensive ones, where on CNN with Wolf Blitzer he claimed to have never written or ready any of them.

In 1996, when the newsletters came up in a local race, Paul claimed the newsletters were being quoted out of context. He even defended the “black youths are fleet of foot” sentiment in one of the newsletters. In 2008 on CNN, though, he claimed never to have read them, so I don’t know how he could have understood the previous context before without reading them. He claims now to not have any idea who wrote the articles, and shockingly, doesn’t care to find out. Not many people, outside of the true blue Ron Paulbots, believe him on that one. I, for one, don’t think he wrote every article, but he knew what was in them and he’s lying now. The New Republic also featured a campaign donation solicitation letter from Ron Paul, that in addition to being filled with kookiness, asked people to buy his newsletters. You have to be almost blind to believe he didn’t know what was in there.

For fun, I though I’d give my responses to some common responses from Ron Paulbots over this issue:

Paulbot: This is old news. He already took moral responsibility for this
me: It’s old news to some people, most of the nation hasn’t heard this before. Also, never before have we had the actual newsletters to read ourselves. Before it was just a few quotes. Oh, and for the record, in 1996 Ron Paul took “partial moral responsibility.” Way to man up, Ron.

Paulbot: Ron Paul is no racist. As soon as he found out, he fired the editor
me: I’ve found no evidence to support the idea that he fired anyone. Quite the contrary, he has claimed to not know what was going on.

Paulbot: What he said was just the truth.
me: I feel sorry for you.

Paulbot: This is just a hit piece by the MSM/Republican Attack Machine/Establishment/International Bankers!
me: He’s running for President of the United States. I don’t think publishing newsletters a candidate was “morally responsible” for qualifies as a hit piece. They didn’t have to make anything up.

Paulbot: He’s still the best one out there!
me: Sorry, racism is more important to me than the gold standard. I feel sorry for you.

Paulbot:It was only one one newsletter. What’s the big deal?
me: The racism, homophobia, paranoia, and kookiness was on a lot of newsletters. You just have to read them.

Paulbot: Libertarians can’t be racist!
me: Really? David Duke isn’t a racist?

Paulbot: Ron Paul is a man of integrity. He wants to blah, blah, blah.
me: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’ve all heard the stump speech. Now let’s see some actual contrition about calling African-Americans “animals”.

Paulbot: We can’t shoot the messenger! We need to spread the message of freedom!
me: As a libertarian, I want to have high standards. Otherwise, why aren’t you supporting David Duke and other states’ rights, “pro-freedom” white separatists?

Paulbot: You’re just a liberal!
me: I’m a libertarian. A real one, not the fake kind that wants states rights to be racist, misogynistic, and homophobic.

Paulbot: You’re just a republican!
me: I’m a libertarian. A real one, not the fake kind that wants states rights to be racist, misogynistic, and homophobic.

Paulbot: You’re just a neocon!
me: I’m a libertarian. A real one, not the fake kind that wants states rights to be racist, misogynistic, and homophobic.

Paulbot: You’re stupid!
me: Thank you for the reasoned and thought out response. I shall take a long retreat and contemplate how to assimilate such startling insight.

Looking forward to new Paulbot-isms!

Update: I meant to put this in, but because of Ron Paul’s self-immolation, this will be my final Ron Paul post. Everyone knows he’s kook now.

Following his good pieces on traffic congestion and medical marijuana, Drew Carey follows those with a great piece on National City, CA taking away a youth center for condos.

This, of course, is a direct result of the Kelo decision a few years ago where the “Liberal” wing of the Supreme Court ruled that a city or state could take your land away and give it to a private developer because of the hope of some economic benefit. So, while I am not suggesting we all go out and demand more Clarence Thomas and Samula Alito type justices, no one should turn a blind eye to the damage “Liberal” justices can do. Kelo was one of the worst decision during my lifetime, and this piece only just brushes the surface of the future problems because of the decision.

Update: Kelly reminded me of the recent Supreme Court decision related to late term abortions, in which the Supreme Court decided it was a medical board dictating what procedures are legal for doctors to perform. I’ve updated to call Kelo “one of the worst” decisions, though outside of Kelo and the late term abortion Decision, I’m at a loss to think of any more that were so related directly to the concept of personal property and personal privacy.

I’ve hard Ron Paul described as many things. He’s a constitutionalist, he’s a libertarian who is in the Republican party just to get in the game, blah, blah, blah. Today, while driving past a billboard that used to have a Ron Paul ad on it, I heard my first Ron Paul radio commercial. The headline of the ad was loud and clear: Ron Paul is a real Republican. He’s out of the closet now! That’s how he himself is now portraying himself: the only real Republican choice. Finally, he has admitted what I’ve known to be true all along. After all, look at his positions on social issues:

* Against a woman’s right to choose at any point in the pregnancy
* Has been known to laugh at the concept of gay marriage (how respectful)
* Has tried his damnedest to use his *federal* power as Congressman to allow states to push religion into our daily lives
* Has a monthly newsletter bearing his name that has published quotes like “If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be.”, “We don’t think a child of 13 should be held responsible as a man of 23. That’s true for most people, but black males age 13 who have been raised on the streets and who have joined criminal gangs are as big, strong, tough, scary and culpable as any adult and should be treated as such.”

Yep, definitely sounding like a Real (Southern) Republican now.

Update: As some Ron Paul-bots pointed out, Ron Paul has not been a senator. I wrote that when I meant Congressman. Post has been updated

I don’t really watch the debates, because honestly, all the presidential candidates are basically in pandering mode now. How else can you explain Hillary Clinton’s inane babble about paying money to people for kids, Guiliani’s 9/11 name dropping at everything including when he orders dinner, to Gravel’s “sticking it to the man” boasts about stiffing credit card companies. It’s just drivel.

Some drivel is worse than others.

Recently, both Romney and McCain blew off the issue of medical marijuana. Politicians, and Republicans especially, have a real blind spot when it comes to the Drug War. They lose all common sense and attempt to legislate medical treatment. Despite all the evidence of it helping cancer patients and the terminally ill, politicians just ignore it, citing outdated reasons from the fifties for keeping marijuana totally illegal in every way.

Let me put it this way: My friend who is having chemo to treat his colon cancer, is unable to get a medical marijuana prescription, but some narcissistic, upper class, douchebag (male or female) is able to get an FDA approved prescription for botulism, a deadly poison, to inject into the folds of skin above the eyes in a desperate attempt to hold on to a few more years of youth.

Yeah, it’s really that dumb.

In tonight’s overhyped, but better than usual, debate, a lesbian couple asked the candidates if they support gay marriage. The only candidate who had the correct answer was Dennis Kucinich. Bill Richardson was close by saying he thought he could realistically achieve civil unions, but not gay marriage. Christopher Dodd and John Edwards flubbed by by saying they didn’t support gay marriage but support civil unions.

Also, a reverend asked why it was okay to use to use religion to deny people their civil rights. John Edwards blew the question with a mostly idiotic answer about his own personal problems with *gasp* the though of a same sex couple being treated any old married couple under the law. If he can’t get past such bigotry, I suggest he drop out of the race and go back to guilt tripping juries into giving him huge sums of cash.

As a party, the Democrats are pretty pathetic when it comes to the issue of gay marriage. Most of them claim to support gay rights, but only with a “separate but equal” policy. Why do they push this antiquated concept? Either they are too weak to stand up to “Big Religion” in this country, or they have been permanently tainted by religious bigotry.

The issue is simple: Marriage in a church, civil unions under the law. That’s it. That’s how it should be. We shouldn’t have two different kinds of state contracts depending on your sexual orientation. That’s blatantly bigoted. If you want to get “married” and have it blessed by Jesus, Ganesh, or some pagan tree god, go for it. Knock yourself out. Just leave everyone else alone.

To all you anti-gay marriage crusaders out there, stop pushing your conservative, outdated, Abrahamic beliefs in the family structure on every else. Oh, and to the rest of the Democratic party, stop raising my taxes.

From “The Duck of Minerva” -

Zorn and Gill report evidence that baseball fans are far more likely to embrace the designated hitter (DH) if they are Democrats:

Most important, and consistent with our expectations, we find that self-identified Democratic Party members are more likely to support the DH rule than are either independents or Republicans; the odds ratio of 1.90 suggests that, on average, Democrats are 90 percent more likely to support the rule than are independents. This implies (we think) that the values that draw the respondents to the Democrats are linked to those associated with supporting the rule. At the same time, the reverse is not true: Republicans are no more or less likely to support the DH rule than are political independents.

I have to ask the question because I’m finding myself agreeing with Dennis Kucinich on an issue. Actually, that’s kind of an exaggeration. While I disagree with most of Kucinich’s platform, he is right on abortion and mostly right when it comes to the drug war. His positions on civil liberties are also mostly right. Where I disagree with him is his economic and foreign policies. I find them to be unworkable and extremely unrealistic. Not sure we need a “Department of Peace” either, when we already have the State department with the capacity for peaceful diplomacy.

But I digress.

What I agree with Kucinich this time, is his outrage at John Edwards and Hillary Clinton for their comments after an appearance at the NAACP. Kucinich has all the details here. (By the way, more props to Kucinich for using Drupal to power his campaign website.).

If Kucinich is being marginalized within his own party, and a major one at that, imagine how hard it is for third party candidates to get national recognition. In 2004, the Libertarian Party had their candidate on 48 of the 50 state ballots for the Presidential election, but were left out of any national debates. The Green Party was also left out, and was actively attacked by the Democrat Party and removed off of some state ballots. The two parties have locked up the system making it very hard for third parties to get any national exposure.

Do I think the Libertarian or Green party candidates had a shot at actually winning? No, I don’t. However, they did have the power to influence the other parties, and they clearly have wide ranging appeal. They should have been allowed in the presidential debates in 2004.

Now, I realize that we can’t let every presidential candidate in on the debates. There must be some objective criteria, like being on the ballot in a certain number of states or receiving a certain percentage of the vote in the last election. Otherwise, we would have Gary Coleman and Gallagher in the debates. I’m not sure yet what the criteria should be, but what we have now is ridiculous.

This might be the first and last post where I write how I agree with Dennis Kucinich, but on an issue like this, it’s easy.

A recent Gallup Poll shows Ron Paul carrying 0% support. I realize in the blogosphere, Ron Paul is the best candidate since Howard Dean. Apparently, Digg users and bloggers love an economically conservative, gay hating, sexist, godbagging Republican. Oh, yeah, I forgot, he’s against the Iraq war, and that trumps all his bigotry. My bad.

I know it gets talked about a lot, but I wonder if Ron Paul is really affecting the “debate”, whatever that means. After all, Republicans have always tried to ban abortion, discriminate against gays, and push their religious beliefs onto others. That’s not something new that Ron Paul brought to the debate. No Republican is adopting his other platform of tearing apart the federal government. So he’s not had an effect there either. As for the Iraq War, please. Republicans are running away from the President because they want to get re-elected, not because of Ron Paul. Does anyone really think Republicans looking to be re-elected would support the war if not for Ron Paul?

So, I see little influence from the Ron Paul campaign. Yeah, he’s big on Digg and YouTube, but come on, big deal. He’s not getting votes, he’s not influencing campaigns. He’s just a gay bashing, woman hating, religious pushing white male from Texas. Um, don’t we already have enough of those?

According to On The Issues, Ron Paul voted yes on “an amendment banning adoptions in District of Columbia by gays or other individuals who are not related by blood or marriage.” It’s just another indication of where Ron Paul stands with regards to treatment of homosexuals. He doesn’t want gays to either marry or raise kids. What a guy.

Furthermore, I would like to bring back Ron Paul’s comments from the debate and highlight once again the evidence of how anti-homosexual he is:

MR. SPRADLING: Congressman Paul, a question for you.

Most of our closest allies, including Great Britain and Israel, allow gays and lesbians to openly serve in the military. Is it time to end “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy and allow gays and lesbians to serve openly in the U.S. military?

REP. PAUL: I think the current policy is a decent policy. And the problem that we have with dealing with this subject is we see people as groups, as they belong to certain groups and that they derive their rights as belonging to groups. We don’t get our rights because we’re gays or women or minorities. We get our rights from our creator as individuals. So every individual should be treated the same way.

So if there is homosexual behavior in the military that is disruptive, it should be dealt with. But if there’s heterosexual sexual behavior that is disruptive, it should be dealt with. So it isn’t the issue of homosexuality, it’s the concept and the understanding of individual rights. If we understood that, we would not be dealing with this very important problem.

To sum up, Ron Paul thinks the current policy is a good one, and that disruptive conduct by heterosexuals or homosexuals should be grounds to dismiss military personnel. On the last part, I agree in general. However, and here is the key point:

Unlike “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and Ron Paul, I don’t think the act of merely saying one is gay is disruptive

There is no other way to interpret Ron Paul’s comments. If he thinks the current policy is a good policy, then he thinks just being gay is disruptive. So despite all the blather about state’s rights, individual freedom, blah, blah, from Ron Paul, that only applies if you’re straight. If you’re gay, forget it. You’re too “disruptive.”

Last night, Ron Paul revealed (not for the first time) his right wing social agenda in response to a question about Bush’s past mistakes. According to Ron Paul, we’ve gotten away from “Christian philosophy” when we enacted pre-emptive war. I’m not sure why Paul felt the need to say “Christian” but judging by his legislative history, it’s because he wants to push a Christian view of society.

In 2004, Ron Paul supported and praised HR 2028, the Pledge Protection Act. The sole purpose of this act is to allow states to mandate that “under God” be allowed in the pledge. How libertarian is it to wink and nod at states forcing religion onto people?

Once again, Ron Paul fails to protect the rights and freedom of the citizens of the United States.